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Uber’s efforts to support the California community through the COVID-19 Crisis

April 6, 2020 / US

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As the Covid-19 pandemic continues to spread across CA, Uber is stepping up to support delivery people and people who drive on our platform across the state, as well as JUMP riders and our restaurant partners on Eats. 

While we have already been working hard through the state to stand up a number of initiatives detailed below, on Tuesday, March 31st Uber announced our commitment to provide 10 million rides and food deliveries to healthcare workers, seniors, and people in need, free of charge around the world, which will now allow us to expand this work even further. We are committed to moving what matters.

Organizations, healthcare providers, and government institutions in California looking for support with rides or food deliveries can reach out to us here. You can find a summary of the individual initiatives that we’ve rolled out in CA to date, below. We’ll continue to update this blog with new initiatives as they launch. 
Earners/Riders
On Sunday, March 15 we announced a financial assistance policy to provide up to 14 days of aid to active drivers and delivery people diagnosed with COVID-19 or individually asked to self-isolate by a public health authority to reduce the risk of spreading the virus. We continue to refine and update this policy given fast-moving developments around the world.
We also announced that we’re working to provide earners in our highest-need cities across the country with disinfectants to keep their cars and delivery equipment clean. Supply chains are still challenging and we want to be responsible actors (prioritizing supplies for those professions most in need), but we’re pushing to get supplies distributed as soon as they’re available. On Thursday, April 2, we announced that disinfectants started to make their way to drivers in Los Angeles and San Francisco.
On Monday, March 16, we announced that Uber is offering a 25% discount (up to $10) for trips taken to or from the food distribution locations set up by the San Francisco Unified School District, and that we donated $50,000 to the San Francisco Unified School District’s non-profit arm, Spark, to help support the organization’s spring break meal service and increase the number of meals served. Today we are announcing that we’re extending the discounted rides program to Friday, May 1 with the code ‘SFUSDMEALS’. We followed up on that on Thursday, March 19 to announce that Uber is offering a 25% discount (up to $10) for trips taken to or from the food distribution locations set up by the Los Angeles Unified School District as well. Today, we are announcing that we’re also extending this program to Friday, May 1 with the code ‘LAUSDMEALS’. 
On Friday, March 20, we announced that we ended UberPool services across CA to prevent the spread of the disease and protect drivers 
We also announced that we’re offering no-penalty return policies for drivers in the US, Brazil, Australia, UK, and India who have rented a car from Vehicle Solutions partners and are diagnosed with COVID-19 and have to self-quarantine
On Monday, April 6 we announced the Work Hub, a new feature in the Uber Driver app that lets any US driver looking for more work to easily find new ways to earn money both on Uber’s platform and with other companies who are hiring extra workers during the COVID outbreak. A gif of the in-app Work Hub is here.
Uber Eats
Also on Monday, March 16 we announced that we’re waiving delivery fees for customers on orders to the more than 100,000 independent restaurants across the U.S and Canada to help demand and keep orders coming in. Independent restaurants constitute 55% of all restaurants on the Eats platform in CA. We’re also making 300,000 meals available to healthcare workers and first responders – hundreds of thousands of which have been given out to date. Interested officials and organizations can reach us at t.uber.com/impact2020As part of the announcement, we launched a new feature that lets restaurant partners receive daily payouts instead of weekly; and made contactless delivery available on UberEats 
On Friday, March 20, we started making it easier for drivers to begin accepting Eats delivery requests, to help stabilize earnings during this challenging, low-demand period on Rides. As part of the program, we waived the 24 hour holding period before a partner could receive his/her first delivery request as a courier. To date, thousands of drivers in CA have used this program to complete their first delivery on Eats
On Friday, March 27, we announced that Uber Eats is a founding partner of a National Employee Relief Fund managed by the National Restaurant Association; and on Friday, April 3, we announced a new feature in UberEats that allows customers to contribute directly to restaurants they order from in the app.As part of the launch of this feature, we’re committing up to $5 million to support U.S. restaurant workers financially impacted by the COVID-19 crisis – including $2 million to the fund, and an additional matching of all direct-to-restaurant contributions made through the new feature, up to $3 million. This product feature will roll-out in NYC starting April 2, then launch in CA next week.
JUMP
On Wednesday, March 25, we announced that JUMP is working with local officials and organizations in San Francisco to provide free e-bike rides (up to 30 min.) to employees of healthcare organizations, first response organizations and emergency services in need. The promotion will run from March 23 – June 1. Interested officials and organizations can request access to the code on behalf of their employees at sf-social-impact@uber.com.